


for years or for hours

by Shadowlit



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Hopeful Ending, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I Wrote This While Listening to Hozier's Music, Implied/Referenced Character Death, In A Week is such a good song though, Past Character Death, READ AUSP_ICE'S FIC GLOW FIRST BECAUSE THIS IS BASICALLY A CONTINUATION, The original characters are kinda just there, they're not actually that important
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:47:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24070828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadowlit/pseuds/Shadowlit
Summary: It takes a long time for them to be found again.
Relationships: Connor/Upgraded Connor | RK900
Comments: 5
Kudos: 42





	for years or for hours

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Glow](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24005440) by [Ausp_ice](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ausp_ice/pseuds/Ausp_ice). 



> so uhhh yeah sorry ausp_ice but i read it and saw your art and basically went ?!?!!?!!! INSPIRATION OVER 9000 and then sat down and blarted this out in an hour  
> it's 3:34 am and i honestly can't be assed to proofread this so if it's bad feel free to yell at me lmao  
> (hey have i mentioned that i really admire how good you (ausp_ice) are at both writing AND art??? because hot damn how do you get that holographic/echo-y effect with your art i nEED TO KNOW IT'S SO GOOD)  
> (and all those straight lines and soft colors...it's like you're painting with light and i love your style so much)  
> title came from hozier's song In A Week

They aren't found for a long time.

Gradually, the two decay. A passing fish sees a chance and takes it, grabbing part of what used to be an arm and swimming off. About halfway through its act of thievery, it realizes that the thing it carries is merely partially corroded plastic and metal rather than flesh and bone, and it wastes no time dropping it and swimming away. Algae starts to cling to them, coating parts both inside and out with a layer of green-blue slime, but otherwise...there is nothing. Nothing, except the slow creep of water into their biocomponents, the corrosion from the salt, the occasional lost part or broken piece from some curious animal.  
  
On one memorable occasion, a small octopus sets up shop in what's left of Connor's torso - most of the biocomponents have rotted away at this point, being biologically-based and all, but the outer plastisteel chassis is mostly intact - and spends well over a year nested where his thirium regulator once was, only occasionally coming out for food.

One day, it doesn't return. No one notices.

Meanwhile, on the surface, the search continues. Orange boats trawl the water, searching for the two, but ultimately to no avail. Eventually, Connor and Nines start to be forgotten. Humanity moves on - they have more important things than two lost androids to deal with - and so do the androids, eventually. The ones close to them don't forget, of course, but that doesn't matter when they're still bound to time.

(Hank loses Russian Roulette a year and a day after they call off the search, and a day after the 15th anniversary of Cole's death. (Yes, the search ended on Cole's death's anniversary. Life was cruel like that.) Gavin dies in a shootout a few years after that.)  
  
(Perhaps if they were there, both would have lived to the ends of their natural lifespans - Hank might've been strong enough to shake off his grief and depression by then with Connor's help, or Nines would have saved Gavin in that last fight - but life doesn't work like that, as much as we'd wish it to.)

(Markus lives for a long while afterward, but he tries not to think about them much. He's still leader of Jericho, after all. He already has too much to do and not enough time to do it, never mind searching for a pair of androids that have been lost at sea for decades.)  
(It doesn't help when he feels the guilt curl around his thirium pump, crushing it ruthlessly, but... But. He still has more to do, always more to do. It's not like they're going anywhere. Jericho, however, is going everywhere. He can search for them later.)

(He never does.)

More time passes. The sands shift slowly, gradually beginning to overtake the remains. Enterprising creatures still try to take parts from time to time, but their bodies have been long picked clean. Almost nothing remains but pieces of the outer layer of plastisteel.  
And a small black box, carefully nestled in Nines' chassis.

It's a fish trawler that finds them. Of all the things - the technology Kamski came up with, the thousands and thousands of dollars spent on good old in-person searching of the sea, the advancements made during the search - it's a fishing trawler. It's not even a good one, either - the thing's almost forty years old and its parts creak like they haven't been oiled for at least twice that long - but it's a boat, and it has people. Life.

And ultimately, it's a rookie mistake that snags what's left of the two - an inexperienced boy who let the net out too long and let it briefly drag across the seafloor, stirring up a flurry of dust in the dim light. In the midst of that, nobody notices when the empty husks of plastisteel are caught in the mesh and swept along with the boat, pulled roughly out of the sediment they're half-mired in. Nobody notices when they're squashed into the net by a thousand silvery fish, their bodies thrashing against the net as the trawler chugs stubbornly on. Dragging them all, kicking and screaming, out of the depths.


End file.
